Coordination Problems, Clumsiness Anxiety Symptoms

How Anxiety Causes Coordination Problems, Clumsiness

Anxiety can cause and contribute to clumsiness and coordination problems for many reasons, including:

1. Anxiety-Activated Stress Response

Anxious behavior, such as worry, activates the stress response, which secretes stress hormones into the bloodstream, where they travel to specific locations to immediately prepare the body for emergency action – to fight or flee. This instinctual survival reaction is often referred to as the Fight Or Flight Response.[1][2]

Visit the “Stress Response” article for the many ways the stress response can affect the body and how we feel.

Some of the stress response changes can cause coordination problems. For instance: such as:

• A sudden increase in energy and muscle tension can impact muscle movements, leading to trembling, shaking and coordination problems.

• A sudden increase in perspiration can lead to sweaty hands, which can let objects slip through your hands and grasp more easily.

• A stimulated sympathetic nervous system can also affect coordination, leading to clumsiness.

• Blood shunted to the extremities can also affect coordination, which can cause coordination.

• A sudden change in brain function can also affect coordination.

• A sudden increase in sensory perception can alter visual perception and muscle coordination, which can create clumsiness and coordination problems.

Any combination of the above stress response factors can cause and contribute to clumsiness and coordination problems.

As long as a stress response is active, it can cause acute clumsiness and coordination problems.

2. Hyperstimulation

Frequently activating the stress response, such as from overly anxious behavior, can leave the body in a state of semi-stress-response-readiness, which we call “stress-response hyperstimulation” since stress hormones are powerful stimulants.

Hyperstimulation is also often referred to as “hyperarousal,” “HPA axis dysfunction,” or “nervous system dysregulation.”[3][4]

Visit our “Hyperstimulation” article for more information about the many ways hyperstimulation can affect the body and how we feel.

Hyperstimulation can cause the changes of an active stress response even though a stress response hasn’t been activated.

Just as an active stress response can cause acute coordination problems, hyperstimulation can cause chronic coordination symptoms.

For instance:

Erratic Nervous System

A hyperstimulated nervous system can act erratically, affecting muscle movements.[5][6]

For instance, when we want to grab a glass, our thoughts generate nerve impulses that travel throughout the nervous system network to the required muscles in the arm, hand, and fingers that allow us to reach for and grab onto the glass. Nerve impulses cause muscles to contract and release, allowing them to move, grab onto, and release when we want to.

The nervous system accomplishes these tasks by sending and receiving nerve impulse information – electrical signals – to and from the brain via specialized cells called neurons. Neurons communicate using an electrochemical process (the combination of electricity and chemistry).[9][10]

This system of communication and reaction performs normally when the body and nervous system are healthy. Problems can occur, however, when the body and nervous system become hyperstimulated.

For instance, because of their electrochemical properties, neurons are particularly sensitive to stress hormone stimulation. When they become overly stimulated, they can act erratically, causing them to “misreport,” “over-report,” and send “false” nerve impulse information to and from the brain.[8][9] These abnormalities can cause a wide range of sensory anomalies, including movement and coordination problems.

Other muscle-related symptoms due to a chronically stressed nervous system include muscle-twitching, spasms, and sporadic and persistent muscle pain, which can also affect muscles and coordination.

Fatigue

Hyperstimulation uses up the body’s energy resources much faster than normal, quickly causing fatigue. When we’re tired, we can experience coordination problems,[7][8] thinking and concentration problems, as well as problems forming and vocalizing our thoughts.

In fact, tiredness can impair a person’s ability to reason and function like that of being impaired by alcohol.[12][13] Just as we can experience coordination problems when under the influence of alcohol, we can have similar difficulties when tired.

Numerous recent studies have found that tiredness can impair our motor skills, causing coordination, reaction time, and judgment problems.[12][13][14][15]

Sleep deprivation

Hyperstimulation can cause sleep problems, which can lead to sleep deprivation. Sleep deprivation can affect coordination like fatigue.

Thinking, concentration, and attention problems

Hyperstimulation can cause chronic brain functioning problems, which can create thinking, concentration, and attention problems that can lead to coordination problems.

3. Behavior

Many anxious people over-analyze, overthink, and worry. These behaviors can create hesitancy and distraction, leading to coordination problems.

As long as the body is hyperstimulated, it can produce coordination problems.

Unfortunately, many of those who struggle with anxiety worry that MS, ALS, a brain tumor, or other neurological conditions may be the cause of their coordination symptoms. Checking on the Internet might cause even more anxiety since coordination problems are common symptoms of these medical conditions. Consequently, worry, which is anxious behavior that activates the stress response, can cause clumsiness and coordination symptoms to persist or worsen.

Other Factors

Other factors can create stress and cause anxiety-like symptoms, as well as aggravate existing anxiety symptoms, including:

• Medication
• Recreational drugs
• Stimulants
• Hyper and hypoventilation
• Low blood sugar
• Nutritional deficiencies
• Dehydration
• Hormone changes
• Pain

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